The Painter's Passion Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Epilogue

  The Painter’s Passion

  The Gentlemen’s Guild, Book 3

  By Dr. Rebecca Sharp

  Copyright2018 for Dr. Rebecca Sharp

  All rights reserved.

  This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by the United Stated of America copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Acknowledgements

  For My Husband – These are all always for you. Even though I will never let you read them, I only know that life can truly be a fairytale because of you.

  Shannon R. – Thank you for all your love, support, hilarious memes and gifs. Thank you for the gifts and care packages. But mostly, thank you for having faith in me on days when I didn’t have faith in myself. Pierce is all yours. xx

  Lisa H. – I’m always blown away by your excitement and enthusiasm for each and every one of my books. I want you to know that I still can’t believe it’s for me. Thank you. A million times over, thank you. xx

  “Painting is a blind man’s profession. He paints not what he sees, but what he feels, what he tells himself about what he has seen.”

  – Pablo Picasso

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Epilogue

  Thank you for reading!

  Other Works by Rebecca Sharp

  Chapter 1

  London

  This was not a good idea.

  No - this was a very fucking bad idea.

  How had this happened to him? He thought. He was always the one who coerced his friends into unfortunate situations. How had he fallen prey to his favorite pastime?

  As Pierce stalked towards the Covent Garden entrance to the Tube, he had to admit there were several reasons that being in London was the best place for him right now. First, there was the fact that he was able to put thirty-five-hundred miles between himself and whatever the hell was happening with Tristan and Sloane – his two best friends and the two other original members of the Gentlemen’s Guild. They’d both gone and fallen in love and Pierce wasn’t taking any chances that that shit might be contagious.

  Fucking assholes.

  Tristan was engaged to Ellie Carter and had recused himself from their popular and successful Guild exhibits, the first fan-fucking-tastic cause of his current mood. Morgan, who was their business manager and also currently in London with him, stepped up and offered to use one of his photographs for the exhibit; one disaster had therefore, been averted. But now, it looked like Sloane and his girlfriend, Cynthia, had worked out their issues which meant that it was only a matter of time before Sloane pulled out of the exhibits, too, or worse, he would continue with pieces that were no longer in their typical, classically erotic style.

  God, that would be so fucking boring. It would ruin everything the Guild stood for.

  Ok, maybe not everything.

  There would still be one aspect of their business left – art restoration and reproduction for major museums around the world. That part was challenging, rewarding, and allowed them to donate millions to fund art programs all over the world. It was also the part that Pierce was currently in the process of fucking up.

  Correction. He’d already fucked it up and had been covering it up for the past few years. Unfortunately, skeletons always seem to find their way out of the goddamn closet.

  Several years ago, while in the middle of restoring Monet’s Bridge over a Pond of Water Lilies, his pride – and his dick – has caused him to lose the priceless artwork. There was a bar… alcohol… and two very beautiful women whom he’d ended up bringing back to his studio to screw. Instead, he’d woken up the following morning, hungover, still hard, and minus the famous painting. There was a ninety-nine percent chance that they’d drugged him because he couldn’t remember much of anything from that night; their faces were only a blur in his mind and his desire for future threesomes had significantly diminished.

  Now, he was trying to fix his asinine mistake with the hopes that it didn’t cost the Guild everything.

  And the effort was making his already fucking miserable personality even more miserable.

  And if there was any place in the world that could mirror his mood, it was London in the fall. Cold, rainy, dark, and dreary; it was a mood that had been becoming more and more permanent since they’d arrived.

  He, Morgan, Morgan’s twin sister – Ana, and Cyn’s friend – Tash, had left New York for the Queen’s backyard about four weeks ago. Why were they all there? Why London? And why was he so damn miserable? All of those questions could be answered with one word – Ana.

  Ana worked for the white-collar crimes division of Interpol. She’d come to New York to follow up on a lead that the Bridge had been stolen. When she’d told her brother what she was working on he’d immediately called a meeting with the rest of the Guild. And that had really been the beginning of the end.

  Before that meeting, no one except Tristan knew that the Monet hanging in the Met was his forgery; that the original artwork was somewhere out in the world with a dirty little thief. It was one of the many demons that haunted him, yet after almost four years, he’d been lulled into the false sense of security that whoever had the real Monet wasn’t planning on letting it go and that his secret would remain safe.

  If there was a God, He must be having a good fucking laugh at his expense.

  Morgan insisted that they bring Ana into the Guild’s veil of secrecy so that she could help them catch the thief who, for some reason, had decided to magically resurface a
fter all these years and sell the original painting to the highest bidder. Morgan laid out his plan before Tristan, Sloane, and Pierce and suggested that they vote.

  He’d been outvoted. And Ana had been let in on their secret little club.

  When new information surfaced from one of her team members back in the U.K. that the thief was still here, they’d planned to head back to London – the scene of the crime – a few weeks after that meeting. However, extenuating circumstances moved up their timeframe and added a fourth traveler – Natasha James.

  Also known as Tash, she was Cynthia’s old roommate and an escort. He’d met her at a bar in the city a few weeks ago when he’d been out with Sloane; it was the night he’d convinced his friend to take Cyn home. He should have known that would come back to bite him in the ass.

  He was happy for Sloane and Cyn… and that they were happy together, he admitted begrudgingly. But, he’d still screwed himself – and screwed Tash; the first figuratively, the second, literally. Tash was a nice girl and they’d both enjoyed themselves, but neither took the evening for more than what it was – and he appreciated that.

  Tash had been out with one of her other clients, Julian Sanchez, when she’d unwittingly discovered serious amounts of drugs on his personal yacht. When Sanchez realized what she had seen, he’d beaten the living shit out of her, putting her in the hospital tie-dyed with purple and black bruises and a broken ankle. Until Sloane, Tristan, and whoever else they could trust to work with figured out a way to bring Sanchez down, Tash needed to get out of the city. Sloane insisted that going with him and Morgan across the pond seemed like the best option.

  And that’s how their band of musketeers ended up in the capital of Great Britain.

  Long live the fucking Queen.

  He laughed to himself in mocking disbelief as he scanned his Oyster card to get on the Tube. He wasn’t thinking about the ninety-odd year old Elizabeth residing in Buckingham Palace. No, he was thinking about the damned desirable monarch who ruled over the townhome that the four of them shared; he was thinking about Ana. He’d needed to get out of the house that morning before he killed someone… or kissed them. So, he’d left and gone for a walk. And he kept walking until Morgan finally called wondering where the hell he was and if he was still alive, reminding him that they had a meeting starting very shortly.

  This morning was just another example of what had been happening over the past four weeks.

  No – even before that.

  From the moment he’d seen Ana, she’d intrigued him and ignored him and that was beyond frustrating. More than that, she’d captivated him and heated his blood like no one ever had before – and that was fucking dangerous. Unknowns were fucking dangerous, which is why he always kept a suffocating grasp on his life – controlling everything to the point where everyone thought he didn’t care about anything.

  And that was the way he liked it.

  He’d met Ana at Tristan and Ellie’s engagement party back in New York City, and everything about their meeting should have told Pierce that anything involving her was a bad fucking idea.

  He hadn’t even known that Morgan had a twin – no one had; apparently, he and Ana had been estranged for some years because of some family shit that neither of them wanted to talk about. Top that off with the fact that she’d been living abroad because of her job. Either way, the fact that he of all people – he who prided himself on knowing everything before everyone – he who liked to keep people on their toes so that no one had the opportunity to throw him off his game – he had been the one taken by surprise. And if her existence hadn’t been enough, her beauty had twisted the knife of ignorance inside of him.

  He’d seen a lot of women, painted them, slept with them… and he had a lot of comparisons that he could make. Some women are stunning, like Cyn for example, whose dark hair and pale skin would stop you in your tracks. But Ana, her beauty was subtle with an implied sensuality. Her golden-brown waves and the warm tan of her skin pulled him in like a moth to a flame. Looking at her was like looking directly at the sun – a brightly glowing light whose beauty burned so radiantly that it would blind you if you weren’t careful. And in an instant, his entire body had turned hard with the need to capture her sunshine and let it drive out his darkness.

  The four of them – Tristan, Sloane, Morgan, and he – were all good-looking; it was one of the many reasons women lined up to be their models and to sleep with them. Out of all of them though, Tristan and Morgan were what most people would consider the classical Greek definition of handsome. Which is why it shouldn’t have surprised him that Morgan’s twin was the female version of that perfection – in spite of the fact that she dressed entirely too conservatively for what he imagined her figure to be.

  And he’d done a lot of imagining in those first few seconds.

  That evening, she’d been wearing some boxy skirt that wasn’t flattering at all and what might have been a more attractively-fitting top if it hadn’t been covered up by the damned sweater.

  And still, he desired her – sweater and all.

  Everything about the situation wasn’t right because it wasn’t what he had been expecting; what he felt for her in that instant was too deep and too powerful for someone like him, especially because he had to fucking feel it for her. Out of all the women in the world, all of the women he’d been with, why did his best friend’s twin have to have this effect on him? That thought made him fucking irritable, but not as much as the fact that she’d made him feel. He hated to feel; feelings are what had almost killed him. So, he pushed anything and anyone away who incited such a reaction. It was why the first thing he’d said to her on being introduced was ‘aren’t you fucking hot?’

  There were many ways to interpret those words; Morgan, of course, as her brother, had taken them the wrong way. Pierce had really just been so unnerved by the news and then his sudden, intense desire for her, that all he could think was ‘why was she wearing a damned sweater in the heat of summer?’

  And he was never unnerved. Never.

  Like something Ellie would do, Ana had fired right back at him – calling him ‘cold’ and walking away towards a glass of wine to warm her back up. Her dismissal only exacerbated his desire. He’d always craved the hard-to-get ones, except that for him, they usually didn’t end up being that hard to get. But this was a different story – Ana was a different story; for the first time, he found himself wanting something that he knew he couldn’t have.

  Something that he didn’t deserve to have – a small voice inside of him whispered.

  Moral of the story? He hadn’t made the best first impression and it had only gone downhill from there. He’d made a brief attempt at being cordial – he’d even thought about some playful flirting – to make up for their first meeting since she was Morgan’s sister, after all; but it had only made her response to him even harsher.

  And he couldn’t decide which feeling it inflamed more – his frustration or his desire.

  It didn’t matter – both demanded the same response: careless, asshole Pierce. He needed to push her away and the best way to do that was to push her buttons – irritation interspersed with blatant flirtatious advances that suggested she keep her distance unless she wanted to be ravished by him. Most would argue that this was his normal self, but it was only normal when he was trying to keep someone at bay for thinking him too soft or that he had started to care too much. The truth was that he couldn’t let anyone care about him.

  He wasn’t worth anyone’s feelings. It wasn’t his fault that certain people – like Tristan, Sloane, and Morgan, and even Ellie and Cyn – chose not to see that in spite of how hard he attempted to make it painfully clear.

  Ana, though… she seemed to see him for exactly what he was worth and for both of their sakes, he needed to keep it that way.

  Until this morning.

  Disappearing beneath the streets into the dark tunnels beneath, Pierce felt his personality becoming more at home. Cursing, he jogged d
own the steps only to realize that he’d missed the latest train, the empty platform now taunting him with dark thoughts from earlier.

  That morning had been like every other morning since their plane had landed at Heathrow. Pierce had woken up with the dawn annoyingly aroused again and wondered for the umpteenth time why his body chose this instead of the willing bed partners he’d invited back to the house to slake his lust – and solidify his reputation in Ana’s eyes.

  He’d thrown on his sweats and went into the sitting room adjoining his spacious bedroom. At least the house she’d procured for them was practically a mansion in the middle of Mayfair. She must be doing well at Interpol to have access to a residence like that.

  Each bedroom had its own private sitting room. In his case, he’d turned that sitting room into his temporary painting studio. And considering how she’d scolded him for bringing food up to his room – it was probably for the best that she didn’t know about the paints that were strewn everywhere. He’d brought some of his supplies with him and then purchased everything else that he needed the first day or two that they were in town.

  After recovering from his jet lag, he’d gone out in search of some lovely women to model for him and take his mind off a very specific, puzzling, and frustrating woman who was off-limits for so many reasons.

  The first night, he’d been his usual charming self and picked up a lovely Brit at a bar nearby who was willing to let him paint her in return for the seductive promise in his dark eyes. Everything was going according to plan until he reached the point where he normally stopped working on the painting in favor of some more vigorous activity. At that moment, the lovely, buxom brunette who had been eagerly awaiting his attentions was now no longer attractive to him.

  Pierce had felt like a train had hit him, knocking every lascivious desire from his body. The shock had only been momentary before rage set in; in retrospect, he felt a small twinge of guilt for telling the woman to get out. The look on his face quickly halted the protest that was about to escape from her mouth – wondering why he intimated that there would be a long, pleasurable night ahead only to kick her out barely two hours in. Again, it was the unexpected that set his temper off.